Rumour and Fact at Baghdad Museum

Free Britannia journal ^ | April 18, 2003) | Anat Tcherikover

[quidnunc]

Media outlets worldwide lament the fate of Iraq's National Museum at Baghdad, said to have been looted on 12 April. All refer to the important archaeological treasures, now nowhere to be seen, and quote museum officials on the horrors of the marauding mob. The Americans are generally blamed for failing to protect the museum. A petition in this matter, organized by Cambridge and Oxford scholars, has already gone to UNESCO (14 April).

Only a few reporters have detected some strange flaws in this story. In the Daily Telegraph (14 April), David Blair observes that the heavy steel doors of the vaults, about one foot thick, show no sign of having been forced open. He also reminds his readers that "Saddam's regime is thought to have removed some artefacts from the museum before the onset of the war". Similarly in the New York Times (12 April), John Burns notes that it remains unclear whether some of the museum's treasures "had been locked away for safekeeping elsewhere before the looting, or seized for private display in one of Mr. Hussein's myriad palaces."

A cursory check of older reports on the Baghdad Museum, published long before the war, in fact upholds these suspicions and more beside. An article by Alistair Lyon, published in www.museum-security.org on 2 December 1998, describes the state of the museum at that time: "Dusty showcases that once glowed with treasures from ancient Mesopotamian cultures now lie empty in the locked rooms of the Iraqi Museum. The Iraqi authorities removed the finest jewellery, statues, pottery and other prized artefacts and stored them in secret caches during the 1990-91 Gulf crisis. Even I don't know where they are, said Donny Youkhanna, assistant director of the museum'. Significantly, Mr. Youkhanna is described in more recent sources as Iraq's chief archaeologist, director general of Iraq’s Antiquities Research Department. If he did not know where the items were in 1998, who did?

On 11 May 2000, CNN's correspondent Jane Arraf reported on the reopening of Baghdad Museum on the occasion of Saddam's birthday. This is how the article concludes: "The museum had been infested with termites, and years of storage have damaged the artwork. … Some of the more spectacular pieces, treasures from the royal tombs in Ur and recent excavations from Nimrod, won't be on exhibit until summer." Ms Arraf was no doubt quoting the Iraqi authorities on the intention to exhibit these treasures, indirectly informing us that they were nowhere to be seen at the time.

With this information at hand, it is instructive to examine the precise sources on the supposedly total looting of 12 April 2003. Both the Telegraph and the New York Times articles say that the story came from a museum official, who may or may not be telling all. There is no corroboration from any other direct witness. It is equally instructive to examine the bulk of photographs taken in the museum between 12 April and 15 April. All show disarrayed storage spaces, which easily fit with CNN's description of the desolation incurred by May 2000. One photograph, reproduced here, shows empty glass showcases. The caption given to this photo by Agence France Presse claims "empty shelves after a mob of looters ransacked and looted Iraq's largest archeological museum in Baghdad". However, this cannot be true because the glass of the showcases is intact. Clearly, these showcases were emptied in an orderly fashion without being broken, which fits best the evidence of 1998, given above.

Surely, the misfortunes of the Baghdad museum are a matter for concern, but likewise the misfortunes of the press on this issue during the chaotic days of 12-15 April 2003.

Sources:

1. Alistair Lyon's article of 1998: http://www.museum-security.org/reports/07798.html#11

2. Sources mentioning Mr. Youkhanna's poistion as chief archaeologist: http://www.cairotimes.com/content/archiv06/iraq.html http://www.geocities.com/iraqinfo/index.html?page=/iraqinfo/sum/articles/graves.html

3. CNN's article of 2000: http://www.cnn.com/2000/STYLE/arts/05/11/iraq.museum/

4. Photographs of Baghdad museum 12-15 April 2003: http://search.news.yahoo.com/search/news/?adv=1&p=baghdad+museum&ei=UTF-8&c=news_photos&o=a&s=&n=20&2=3&3=

5. Academic petition to UNESCO, 14 April 2003, http://users.ox.ac.uk/~wolf0126/petition.html and its background website: http://users.ox.ac.uk/~wolf0126/index.html

6. NYT article of 12 April 2003: http://www.nytimes.com/2003/04/12/international/worldspecial/12CND-BAGH.html

7. Telegraph article of 14 April 2003: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=%2Fnews%2F2003%2F04%2F14%2Fwmus14.xml

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Facts?! We don't need no steenking facts!!

America bad, Saddam Hussein good, that is all we need to know.

[wastoute]

Just another footnote in the ongoing struggle. Conservatives will never triumph, because they have this defect that the liberals don't: they require truth. The liberals had a heads up on this and the headlines flew out, "Bush fiddles while atniquites are lost, greatest tragedy since Nero". By the time the truth comes out the "public" has forgotten everything but "Bush=bad". The media delights in carrying these messages, in fact they actively participate in staging the stuff. Just another episode in the struggle between good and evil.

[Shermy]

Those iraqi museum officials protesting the most...I'd check their houses for loot.

[jnarcus]

Well that and the interesting thought that these "looters" were smart enough to take originals but not the fakes...hmmm It is soooo much easier to blame US but that's not new is it? Hope this story gets the play it deserves

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Hope this story gets the play it deserves.

Surely you jest.

The press has to get even for being made to look foolish with their "quagmire" predictions.

[Only1choice____Freedom]

They can't let facts deter the agenda.
After all that's what's most important isn't it?
Support Hussain and hope Americans fail for the agenda.
CNN hides stories to prop up the agenda.
Deny the fact the battle is over and argue for "peace."

Anything but the agenda.

The agenda MUST go on.
It MUST live.
LIVE! I TELL YOU!
I COMMAND YOU!

Dr. Frankenstein has spoken.

[Lee Heggy]

Of course the finest and most valuble items were removed. Probably about a monthago at least if they even were there to begin with. Most of what was in the museum when it was 'looted' was secondary material akin to 3000 year old telephone books and tupperware.

[Newkid]

I would say that there is an active group of Republican Guards, who disappeared from the battle lines into the general Iraqi population who are under orders to cover-up as much as possible, the sins of the Saddam regime.

It turns out, per some respectd reports, that battles didn't happen because of agreements between coalition commanders and Iraqi generals. Time and time again, those forces just melted away, saving a lot of causulties on both sides.

Now these loyal Saddamites have become the core of anti-US foment, manipulated as needed. The mullahs seem to be using them to stage Anti-American tirades and events.

As government buildings were looted, computers and papers were taken, or destroyed, under the guise of anti-Saddam outbursts. The real goal of such civil disobedience was to get to the sites before the Americans could, getting rid of intelligence or damning evidence.

The organized and specific looting at the Museum is just another great coverup of the prior misdeeds at the Museum, with America getting the international blame.

Expect a lot more such events, with the target being America's reputation and/or the de-stablization of any government set up by the US.

[labowski]

They'll end up in the Louve in Paris.

[ScaniaBoy]

Thanks for posting this. Very useful links.

According to other posts regarding the looting from the archological museum experts said it did not seem like wanton looting but rather a planned robbery (with inside help).

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/895129/posts

If the treasures were removed by Saddam and his family to adorn their palaces they may turn up in Iraq (probably hidden). If they on the other hand have been sold off they should turn up on the European and North-American market.

(Mentioned on Swedish TV that artefacts have started to turn up on the black market in Paris. Unattributed statement, though...)

Anyway, it seems that once again our news people have failed to carry out a reality-check. Lots of the photo-evidence does not bear out the description of full scale looting...

I guess the blinkers have been put on again (if they ever were off...)

[reformedliberal]

"The museum had been infested with termites, and years of storage have
damaged the artwork."
________________________

From what I could see, the buildings were stone. The artefacts from prehistory are mostly either metal, stone or ceramic. There is not a lot of available wood in the region, AFAIK. Even centuries of storage will not affect bronze or gold and will only tarnish silver. Stone and ceramic will become dusty, hardly *damage*. Even natural pigment decoration is fine if kept from prolonged direct sunlight.

I have Oceanic artefacts that are over 30 years old and they have survived the volatile temperatures and humidity of the American midwest and exposure to natural light. These include items with reed, grass, paper fiber and human hair elements. I have yet to discover even a tiny insect infestation. The worst that has happened is that organic gums used as glue to attach shell elements to wood have dried out. I have tapas (paper mulberry tapestries decorated w/earth and soot pigments)on several walls and even these are still in good shape.

Something fishy has been going on w/this museum collection for a long time, IMO.

[LiteKeeper]

"You shall know the Truth, and the Truth shall set you free"...unless you are a leftist liberal, and then it can get real embarrassing!

[NewEnglander]

Unless your work/report for CNN. Then the true does not matter. In fact if you tell the real story, the true, you are fired.

[yankeedame]

Facts?! We don't need no steenking facts!!

America bad, Saddam Hussein good, that is all we need to know.

=================

You got that right, neighbor!

[TexasCajun]

...if there was anything of value in Baghdad, "Shoe-Shine Boy & Sons" would have had it, don't you think! Hummm.....

[mrustow]

Conservatives will never triumph, because they have this defect that the liberals don't: they require truth.

I don't think things are as bad as they seeem; otherwise, Gore would have won in 2000, and the GOP would have been swept in the 2002 elections.

While the socialists control the schools, universities, and mainstream media, nevertheless, they have failed to parlay all that power into an electoral dictatorship, which I find remarkable. The Internet, talk radio, and Fox News have all helped to support anti-communist Americans against the racist/red menace. And alternative media aside, conservative and centrist Americans have had enough time to develop a storehouse of experience of socialist media fraud, so as to read mainstream stories with a jaundiced eye.

Although I'm by nature a "the cup is half empty" kind of guy, and clearly, things are plenty bad, they could be a heck of a lot worse.